Moscow – Kremlin Says Charges Over U.S. Election Tampering Prove Nothing

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    A security guard speaks on the phone outside the Concord Catering office in St. Petersburg, Russia, Sunday, Feb. 18, 2018.  The U.S. government allege the Internet Research Agency started interfering as early as 2014 in U.S. politics, extending to the 2016 presidential election, saying the agency was funded by a St. Petersburg businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin. (AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov)Moscow – The Kremlin said on Monday that U.S. charges against 13 Russians and several Russian companies accused of meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election campaign contained zero proof of Russian state involvement.

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    The comments were the Kremlin’s first reaction to charges drawn up by the office of U.S. Special Counsel Robert Mueller which centered on a Russian businessman nicknamed ‘Putin’s cook’ by the Russian media who U.S. officials say has extensive ties to the country’s military and political establishment.

    The full indictment, released on Friday, said that a Russian propaganda arm funded by the businessman, Evgeny Prigozhin, oversaw a criminal and espionage conspiracy to tamper in the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign to support Donald Trump and disparage Hillary Clinton.

    The charges are awkward for the Kremlin which is keen to try to build a relationship with Trump in the hope that could eventually lead to U.S. sanctions imposed over its role in Ukraine being lifted.

    The election-meddling allegations have soured U.S.-Russia ties further however, triggering new sanctions as well as pressure for more restrictions. Friday’s indictment and news that Mueller’s investigation is not yet finished mean the issue is likely to dog the troubled relationship for a long time.

    Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday that the U.S. indictment centered purely on individuals and presented no tangible proof that the Kremlin itself or Russian government agencies were involved.

    “They (the Americans) are talking about Russian citizens, but we have heard in announcements from Washington accusations about the involvement of the Russian state, the Kremlin and the Russian government,” Peskov told reporters on a conference call.

    “There are no indications that the Russian state could have been involved in this and nor can there be any. Russia did not meddle, does not have the habit of meddling in the internal affairs of other countries, and is not doing so now.”

    ‘PUTIN’S COOK’

    The U.S. indictment of Prigozhin, nicknamed ‘Putin’s cook’ because of his catering business that has organized banquets for the Russian leader and other senior political figures, is uncomfortable for the Kremlin.

    Prigozhin, 56, has boasted of meeting Putin and of the Russian leader being impressed with his business acumen. The Kremlin did not refer to Prigozhin by name in its Monday comments.

    The U.S. Treasury had sanctioned Prigozhin previously, in 2016, for providing material support to senior Russian government officials, saying he has extensive business dealings with the Russian Defence Ministry.

    Friday’s indictment accused him of funding the St. Petersburg-based Internet Research Agency, known for its trolling on social media.

    Companies which he directly or indirectly owns or controls are listed in an official corporate database as having won lucrative state contracts for the Russian presidential administration, parliament, and the defense ministry.

    His biggest business appears to be supplying food to state-run schools and universities. One of the firms he owns and manages won contracts in that sector worth 459,467,464,056 rubles ($8.15 billion) between 2011-2017, the same database shows.

    Prigozhin did not respond to a request for comment sent via his companies on Monday. On Friday, the RIA news agency cited him as saying he was unfazed by the indictment.

    “The Americans are very emotional people, they see what they want to see. I have great respect for them. If they want to see the devil, let them,” RIA quoted him as saying.

    The Kremlin has repeatedly denied it tried to influence the 2016 election, casting such allegations as part of an anti-Russian campaign in the United States which it says is primarily designed to hurt Trump politically.


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    15 Comments
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    hashomer
    hashomer
    6 years ago

    Nothing coming out of Tsar Pootin’s KGB Kremlin means anything. He’s killed off any hope for freedom and justice in his prison state, pushing Cossack and Rus Orthodox culture, which is inherently anti-Jewish. May the Lord bless and keep the Tsar….far away from us…

    achassidisheyid
    achassidisheyid
    6 years ago

    I think the headline for this article should be changed to read:
    Washington DC—-Trump Says Charges Over U.S. Election Tampering Prove Nothing

    abilenetx
    abilenetx
    6 years ago

    Russia is laughing it’s head off, here is a nation that is running around chasing its own tail. If you have ever owned an animal all you have to do is put something on its tail what it does not know it is, and it will run around and around trying to catch its unknown thing. It takes a sane person to say enough is enough and remove that thing that is driving the animal crazy. When will some one in this country say enough is enough and move on, for Russia got what it wanted to do is cause confusion and that is all and obviously it was successful.

    6 years ago

    To #1 -Hashomer- Putin has very friendly relations with Russian Jewry, as well as with Eretz Yisrael. Therefore, stop painting him as being in the same league with the Tsar!

    PaulinSaudi
    PaulinSaudi
    6 years ago

    Well, I suppose if the Russians want us to prove something they will just have to hand these people over to the US Courts where the government will lay out its proof.